


Reclamation

by ginnywheezy



Category: A Song of Ice and Fire - George R. R. Martin, Game of Thrones (TV)
Genre: Adventure, Alternate Universe - College/University, Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, F/M, Mystery, Other Additional Tags to Be Added, Reincarnation, Romance, Sibling Bonding, Slow Build, Slow Burn, Stark Family Reunion(s) (ASoIaF)
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-12-31
Updated: 2019-01-19
Packaged: 2019-10-01 07:15:06
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 12,291
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17239814
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ginnywheezy/pseuds/ginnywheezy
Summary: For as long as she can remember, Sansa has felt like a half-finished puzzle. Like an empty space has been lodged somewhere inside her, and she can’t find the pieces to fill the gap.Something marked the Starks when they died. Several millennia later, there are debts still to be paid, and more to their return than meets the eye. Armed with her memories, Sansa sets out to find her siblings for a long overdue reunion.





	1. Prologue

#### Prologue

 

For as long as she could remember, she had felt like a half-finished puzzle. Like an empty space had been lodged somewhere inside her, and she didn’t have the pieces to fill the gap.

Most days, she could pretend that the pieces she did have were enough. That she could put them together and find the places they went in, even if they never quite fit. There was always something to distract her from dwelling on it for too long — homework, extracurriculars, rumors circulating about in school.

But sometimes, she felt the loss keenly. Loss of what exactly, she couldn’t say. All she knew was that it didn’t matter whether she had exams to study for or student council meetings to plan or a date to look forward to — there was something missing. Something important.

At night, she dreamed. They were lurid, macabre dreams that made her heart pound and her cheeks wet and her bed covers twist around her like a straitjacket. Dreams that drew her attention to the hollow ache in her middle, though they were little more than flashes of memory in the gray, murky haze. Flashes of fire and blood. Of still bodies and unseeing eyes. Of melted snow and stone ruins.

Once, when she had fallen asleep on the couch in the living room, Robbie had shaken her awake, looking frightened and worried. He had asked her why she was trembling, why she was crying, why she was whispering strange names in her sleep, but she hadn’t been able to answer him. An overwhelming wave of relief had washed over her at the sight of her brother —  _alive alive alive_ — and she had held on to him as if he were a lifeline, sobbing and shaking uncontrollably as he goggled in confusion.

But there were good dreams too. Dreams of a man with hair like spun gold, his eyes bright and jaded all at once. Dreams of a pair of young boys who looked like Robbie, with their deep blue eyes and thick auburn hair. Another boy, brooding and dark-haired. A girl with the same long face and grey eyes.

Dreams of a sprawling castle made of grey stone, its corridors dim and draughty but inexplicably familiar. Dreams of a tall, graceful tree, with blood-red leaves and unwrinkled bark over white wood, a face carved into its wide trunks. Dreams of blankets of powder white snow, of misty fog and cold air, of ice glistening in the sunlight.

_Home_ , she knew, without knowing how she knew. _This_ _was_ _home_.

When she came to realize what it meant — the dreams, the nightmares — there had been no sudden, heart-stopping moment of realization. There had been no grand epiphany, no overdramatic reveal. She couldn’t pinpoint the exact time it happened — she wasn’t even sure if there was one precise moment when she finally understood. It simply came to be that one day, she _knew_ , in that instinctive way one spoke a language learned in childhood.

They called her Alexandra Stiles, but she had never not known who she really was.

Alex, Lexie, Al — even now, she bristled at the name. A part of her would always itch to correct them, would always have to bite her tongue and smile through clenched teeth.

_Sansa_ , she wanted to say. _My name is Sansa Stark._

* * *

 

Sometimes, she wondered if Robbie remembered.

Her brother was the stereotypical, all-American popular boy. The star quarterback with his pretty cheerleader girlfriend and a 4.04 GPA. Probably destined for a football scholarship or an Ivy League. Well-mannered, charismatic, perfectly respectable — the sort of boy mothers wanted their young, impressionable daughters to marry.

Even her friends were smitten with him, to her disgust. Many sleepovers at her house had been wasted on their giggling over his dreamy eyes and dreamy hair and dreamy smile.

But Sansa only ever knew him as the dorky older brother who cried every time they watched The Lion King and sang Celine Dion off key in the shower. The comic book geek who crammed his homework because he was too busy filling his sketchbook, who laughed at horror movies but still got nightmares when he watched them. The nerd who wrote a valedictory speech out of Smash Mouth lyrics at ten years old, but scorned the idea of running for class president.

For all his popularity, Robbie wasn’t too keen on having a social life outside of school. He was more likely to use babysitting her as an excuse to stay in rather than party with his friends, and Sansa’s weekends were often spent with the two of them curled up on the couch, watching Disney Channel as he drew.

Most of his drawings were cartoons, stuff like superheroes from his comics, characters from Sansa’s books, caricatures of his teachers and classmates. He drew animals, too, always in movement, as if they were moving across the page — ravens in full flight, galloping horses, dragons in attack. He drew wolves over and over, each one as huge and ferocious and graceful as the last — but they weren’t direwolves. Robbie had looked at her oddly when she had asked.

“They’re just doodles,” Robbie said, when she peered over his shoulder to see his latest piece. “It’s not really _real_ art.”

“As opposed to what? Fake art?”

“You’re too young to use words like _opposed_ ,” he said fondly. “I just mean, these drawings — they’re not a big deal, that’s all.”

His drawings of people were more realistic. There were less embellishments, less whimsicality, but Sansa thought they were beautiful all the same. It was these drawings that lined the walls of his bedroom, some framed and others stuck with pins, tape, or sticky tack. The pages were strewn across each side and corner in a haphazard sort of way, making the room appear more chaotic than it actually was.

Nearly all the framed drawings were of their dad. Sansa had only ever seen him in photographs, but she could see the resemblance — tall and handsome, with an easy smile and twinkling eyes. Mom saw it too, and she would get teary-eyed whenever her gaze landed on these sketches.

A drawing of a greying, solemn-looking man was also framed, but this one, Sansa was less sure of. It wasn’t an exact likeness, though she couldn’t tell in what way. While she knew there was something wrong with it, there wasn’t much she remembered of the planes of his forehead or the slope of his nose. There wasn’t much of him she remembered at all.

Maybe Robbie didn’t either. When he let her flip through his sketchbooks, Sansa saw bits and pieces of the man's face scattered throughout, crossed out or hastily erased or traced over, like he was trying to relearn the shape of the man’s ears, the crinkles of his eyes, the line of his jaw.

There was one face Sansa didn’t recognize, that kept reappearing on Robbie’s walls and in the pages of his sketchbooks.

“Who’s this?” she said, eyeing the slightly wrinkled paper and its worn corners.

Robbie leaned closer, frowning. His fingertips hovered just above the page. “No one. Probably someone I saw in the bus or something.”

“Or something,” Sansa said. She tried to smother the bit of hope that stubbornly flared up at his doodles or fake art or whatever it was he called them. “Must have been, for you to keep drawing her.”

“Does it matter?”

“Well, it’s a bit creepy. No offense.”

“Fully offended.”

“Just saying . . . your girlfriend probably thinks it’s creepy.”

He rolled his eyes. “Olivia doesn’t mind who I draw. Not everyone is as nosy as you.” At her doubtful look, he added, “Anyway, it’s not important. She’s no one.”

But something flickered in his eyes then, as if Robbie himself didn’t quite believe it.

Sansa wondered what it must be like to know someone like that — to know a person so well, so clearly that she could map all their lines and edges with certainty. She wondered if she had ever been _known_ like that, and if she would ever be.

* * *

 

In some ways, this life was better. Easier.

The Stiles were normal in every way, the poster family of their neighborhood. The model family that did no wrong, so outwardly perfect that other people only ever had nice things to say about the matriarch and her two children. The sort of family to whom nothing gossip-worthy ever happened.

Passing Calculus and dating the cute boy from the basketball team were the extent of Alex Stiles’ problems. She wasn’t weighed down by thoughts of rebuilding Winterfell or of feeding a kingdom or of fighting Mad Queens. Dragons and the Others were the stuff of legends, and she never had to worry about fairy tales come to life.

She still liked poetry and romance, those silly, girlish things she adored as Sansa Stark. She watched rom-coms with her friends and bought fantasy novels that made Robbie groan. She loved musicals and singing in the school choir, and had nursed the thought of being a ballerina until the end of middle school.

In her spare time, she sewed and embroidered, even if it was no longer expected of her. She mended rips and holes in Robbie’s old shirts, stitched monograms as presents for her relatives, made little designs and patterns on framed fabrics and the corners of handkerchiefs. Her mother thought them pretty, but she didn’t linger on the leaping silver trouts or the racing grey wolves any more than she lingered on the dainty flowers or sweet quotes.

Sometimes, she wondered what her dad would have thought of them. If the tacky pickup lines she stitched would have made him snicker as Robbie did. If he would have liked bold colors over pastel like Mom. If he would have recognized the carefully embroidered sigils.

Alex had been five years old when Ethan Stiles died. Over the years, she pestered Robbie with questions about their dad. _What did his voice sound like? What was his favorite color? Did he like to dance too?_ Robbie had answered them all, but Sansa saw how harder it got each time. When he struggled, he would repeat a story that she now knew by heart — of Dad’s wonderful voice, as sweet as hers, and how Mom wept and fell in love the first time he sang to her.

“He loved you very much,” Mom always said, whenever Sansa asked her about Dad. “More than anything, more than life — you and your brother both.”

Sansa supposed she must have loved him too. What did it say about her that she didn’t know if she missed him? That she never dreamed of him? Her only memory of him was when he sang her a lullaby about bluebirds and lands over the rainbow, and she wasn’t even sure if it was real or something her mind conjured from Robbie’s stories.

When her nightmares were too much, when the emptiness kept her up at night, she imagined Dad singing it to her, imagined herself joining him and the smile he would have given her. _You are Sansa Stark_ , he would tell her, _but you are also Alex Stiles. My little princess, my brave girl_. It eased her guilt somewhat, and she let herself pretend it was enough.

Still, there were parts of being _just_ Sansa Stark that she missed — the ghostly melody of the high harp, the soft kiss of snow on her cheek, the sting of cold air against her skin.

The feel of a calloused hand on the small of her back. The glint of gold in the firelight.

It was her siblings she missed most of all. Although they starred in her dreams, no matter how much she tried to trace their likeness on the inside of her eyes, the details escaped her when she woke. In the morning light, their features blurred like an unfinished watercolor, her memories of them dimming and fading with each year.

Sometimes, though, Sansa thought she could see the ghost of her younger brothers in Robbie’s face — the set of Rickon’s chin, the angle of Bran’s cheekbones. She could never see Arya or Jon or Father in Robbie’s features, but some days she saw them in the way Robbie carried his shoulders with each quick stride, in the nimbleness of his feet when he ran, in the way his brows furrowed when he stared into space.

Sansa wondered if he saw them too, if he even remembered as she did. Would Robbie — _Robb_ — see their siblings when he looked at her? Would he see their father in Alex Stiles, in her?

She wondered, too, why it was just them, her and Robb and their mother. Where were Arya and Jon and Bran and little Rickon? Where was the rest of their pack and why didn’t they come back? _Did_ they come back? Did they even exist in this new world?

And why, of all the people in Westeros, of everyone who could have returned, did it have to be _Sansa_ who remembered?

It was another thing that made her toss and turn at night. Remembering didn’t make the hole in her chest easier to bear, and knowing that she had no one to share it with — not Mom, not Robb — was a different kind of burden from what she had carried a lifetime ago. She would have called it a cruelty, had she been inclined to believe the gods were capable of it.

Alex Stiles had no such worries. But Sansa —

Sansa felt as she had in King’s Landing, in the Vale, in the ruins of Winterfell — as though she was moving through a heavy fog, numb and empty and so, so alone.

* * *

 

Alex was thirteen when she got her first serious boyfriend — or as serious as any relationship could be in eight grade, at any rate.

Jason Rowle sat behind her in her English and History classes, and had a habit of making quips and sarcastically fact-checking their teacher under his breath. One such comment had caught Sansa so off guard that she had laughed loud enough to make the teacher turn to her peculiarly. She had always found Jason to be mildly amusing, but she started to consider him more seriously after that. She began to notice how endearing his awkwardness could be, how he had a wicked sense of humor and a seemingly bottomless supply of trivia about almost everything. Short and slim, he wasn’t the most handsome boy in their year, but he was sweet and quiet, and his eyes were a brilliant green, sharp and beautiful.

She liked his eyes. They reminded her of another pair, of another shade of green.

They talked about schoolwork at first, but it wasn’t long before their conversations turned to music and literature and movies. Their chats between classes changed to chats while he walked her home, then to chats in Starbucks, in the mall, in the park. They didn’t have a lot in common, but it was easy to talk to him, like talking to a counselor without all the baggage.  

Robbie hadn’t approved — but then, he never approved of any boy who so much as looked at her.

“You’re too young to be going out with anyone! _Dating_ shouldn’t even be part of your vocabulary!” Robbie would exclaim whenever it was brought up, and Sansa had to stifle a bitter laugh every time. After all, hadn’t she been the same age when she married? Hadn’t Robb been only a few moons older when he began fighting a war?

To his credit, Jason was at least fairly successful at hiding how intimidated he was by her brother. Robbie was begrudgingly impressed that his glares and vague threats didn’t seem to perturb Jason when he came to pick her up for their middle school dance.

Their mom, for her part, didn’t mind that Sansa dated, and relished in embarrassing her by taking pictures and cooing at the roses Jason brought and _oh you two look so lovely together — don’t they look lovely, Robbie?_ Jason smiled gamely through it all, and Sansa blushed and prayed for the ground to swallow her whole.

“You look beautiful, Alex. Like a princess,” Jason said with far more sincerity than such a trite statement deserved.

Mom beamed so wide that the shine of her teeth was nearly blinding. “No,” she said. “You look like a queen.”

* * *

 

When she dreamed of those last years of her life as Sansa Stark, she dreamed of Jaime Lannister.

Sitting across the table at meals. Walking with her in the hallways. In her periphery when she prayed in the godswood. In her sitting room when she worked. . . . With all that had happened to her, it was surprising how mundane these dreams were, how _normal_.

And yet she remembered them with stunning clarity. It didn’t seem fair, when she could hardly remember her own parents. What would they have said if they knew? Her siblings? _Robb_?

The worst part — the part that would have, no doubt, made her family shake with mingled fury and horror — was that she didn’t mind these dreams. Not in the slightest. What guilt she felt wasn’t enough for her to wish them away.

Since he had found her, Jaime had always been _there_ , always within sight and never too faraway. When he stood beside her, Sansa had felt a measure of — contentment, perhaps. Comfort. She had been alone but so had he, and she had found solace in that. In knowing that the weariness in his shoulders matched her own, that his losses plagued his nights as hers did, that he _understood_.

When she dreamed of him, everything else fell away. There was only Jaime, and his image was as crisp as a photograph. In her mind’s eye, she could see his hair catching in the sunlight, his long-lashed green eyes, the sarcastic slant of his lips.

But Sansa also remembered how his eyes had sought hers each time he walked into a crowded room. How his mocking smirk faded into earnestness when he made her laugh. How he sometimes looked at her with . . . wistfulness? Hope? Sansa had kept meaning to ask.

_Later_ , she had told herself then. _Not yet. There’s still time._

She had been wrong, though. There hadn’t been enough time, in the end.

* * *

 

There was an oak tree in the Stiles’ backyard. When they were children, Sansa had roped Robbie into helping her paint the wood white and needled him into carving a face into the trunk.

“Like in Pocahontas,” she had told him. “So we can have our own Grandmother Willow.”

Robbie had been bewildered by the whole thing, but had been too terrified at thought of making his little sister cry to not give in. Of course, Mom had been horrified to discover what they had done, and had grounded them both for weeks.

It had been worth it, though. The paint may have chipped off and the face may have been a crude carving, but it was the closest thing Sansa had to a heart tree. As a little girl, she used to imagine it was the weirwood tree in Winterfell, and she prayed there as she would have in the godswood.

Every time Robbie caught her in prayer, Sansa would say that she was talking to the tree about her problems — which, she supposed, wasn’t entirely untrue. He thought it was a silly, childish habit, but he never mocked or dismissed it, and would always end up joining her, pretending that he too was asking for guidance from Grandmother Willow. They had long since outgrown those games of make-believe, but when Sansa’s heart was heavy with half-forgotten memories of home, she still went back to the tree, feeling at peace under the shade of the branches.

Robbie didn’t go there as much as Sansa did, but sometimes she would see him leaning against the trunk, his gaze distant and shadowed, his mind somewhere too far to reach. It was something that had been happening more often, since he and Mom had fought over his decision to defer his slot in Yale.

Even Sansa hadn’t expected it. Robbie and Mom had been talking about Yale University since he had been old enough to spell. It was their dream — for him to go to a prestigious school, get a respectable degree, head off to law school. Maybe even go into politics, to follow in their family’s footsteps by the time he turned thirty.

When his acceptance letter came, Mom had thrown grace and composure to the wind and sobbed for hours. She clutched Robbie to her and showered him with proud kisses, and though he mumbled protests and turned as red as his hair, he was just as excited. At least, it seemed so.

But then two days after graduation, Robbie showed Sansa and their mom the letter and course handbook from the School of the Art Institute of Chicago. Needless to say, Mom wasn't happy, and Robbie’s attempts to convince her devolved into a screaming match that ended with all three of them hoarse and in tears.

Sansa had never seen either of them so angry, and she wondered now if — _when_ — they would reconcile. Mom still refused to accept that Robbie was going to Chicago — had even said point blank that she wouldn’t pay a cent if he went though with it, though Sansa couldn’t say how serious the threat was — and Robbie was determined to not be the first to apologize.

Sansa’s resolve to steer clear of the issue weakened in the weeks that followed. Being caught in their passive aggression — all the awkward meals and cold shoulders and being the go-between — gnawed at her patience. Until, at last, it dwindled down completely one August evening, after yet another dinner punctuated with pointed remarks and exasperated sighs.

“If you’re not going to talk to her,” she said testily, stomping over to the oak tree, “why can’t you just eat in your room? Lock yourself in there like us normal angsty teens. Leave me out of it!”

Robbie looked up at the sound of her voice. He was sitting on the ground with his legs drawn up, his wrists resting on his knees so his arms were straight, his sketchbook lying next to him untouched. When she was standing over him, he dragged a hand down his face, sighing.

“This isn’t about you, Al,” he said sternly. “I’m sorry you’re in the middle of it all, but this thing with Mom . . . it’s complicated, all right? You’ll understand it one day.”

She clapped her hands on her hips. “Make me understand now! Because it’s been weeks and weeks and you can’t keep going on like this! You can’t just ignore each other forever.”

“I wasn’t planning on it.”

She scoffed. “Could’ve fooled me.”

Robbie made a face but said nothing to her cheek.

“Well?” she said.

“Well what?”

“Are you going to talk to her?”

“Not right now.”

“You can’t just —”

He cut her off with a look that drew on all his three years of seniority. “Leave it, Al. I’m not in the mood to be lectured. Stay if you want, but I’m not listening to another sermon.”

Sansa deflated, but she crossed her arms and jutted her chin before Robbie could see. “No need to be nasty about it. If you wanted to brood in peace, you could’ve just said so.”

“I’m not brooding,” he said. “I’m talking to Grandmother Willow.”

“Funny. Next you’ll be telling me you’re going to break into song.”

“I might. Scared I’ll upstage you?”

“Scared for my eardrums,” she retorted, then motioned for him to scoot over.

But Robbie didn’t move. “No talking about Mom. Or Chicago. I’d rather get run over than have a heart-to-heart with you.”

“What if we got drunk?”

His brow puckered disapprovingly. “You’re fifteen and underage —”

“Not like that stopped _you_ from drinking —”

“I’m not exactly a paragon of virtue, am I? In case you haven’t noticed, I’m Mom’s latest cautionary tale.”

“I thought you didn’t want to talk about it.”

He scowled. “I don’t. Mom and Yale — anything involving college is off limits. Got it?”

Sansa paused a moment, just to tease him. “Only if you promise not to do the jazz hands.”

“I’ll resist the urge,” he said, and though his lips quirked, his expression didn’t clear.

“So what am I allowed to talk about?” she said as she sat next to him. “You’ve banned pretty much every sensible topic I can think of.”

Sansa expected another smart remark, but Robbie didn’t answer. He didn’t say anything for a long while, his frown etching deeper and deeper into the sides of his face. He had been wearing that look a lot lately, but she couldn’t remember seeing Robb Stark look so grim.

With a pang, Sansa realized she would never know. He was older now than Robb had ever been, and older still than when Sansa had seen him last. Did he look like this, when he had been king? Did he look as he did now, when he had been bowed by the weight of the crown on his head and the North on his back?

As Robbie sank back into his thoughts, Sansa rested her head on his shoulder and flipped through his sketchbook. The most recent pages were drawings of sceneries she didn’t recognize, of hillside towns and endless rivers and a castle rising from the waters. Marveling at his careful strokes, at the painstaking detail, she could almost understand why Robbie did what he did, why he refused to give in to their mom’s demands.

_How could Mom ask him to give all this up?_ But then Sansa couldn’t imagine giving up an Ivy League degree either, so what did she know about what went on in Robbie’s head.

Sansa stopped at one page. It was a sketch of a boy, dark-haired and smug-looking. Another one of those almost-familiar faces, another relic of a different life. She had seen him before, she knew, but that was as far as her recollection went. She supposed he must have been important to Robb, for her brother to hold on to him.

A name was on the tip of her tongue when Robbie suddenly moved away, taking the sketchbook from her hands, and the moment passed.

“Something’s going to happen,” he said, his gaze steady and fixed on hers. “I don’t know when yet, but soon.”

“That sounds ominous,” she said, trying to keep her tone light. “What’s this then? A confession? A warning?”

He breathed out a shallow laugh. “You can call it that,” he said. “But it’s more of a favor, really.”

“Oh?”

“Whatever happens, Al,” he said, his voice grave, “promise me you’ll stay out of it.”

Sansa’s eyes narrowed. “What this about?”

“Promise me.”

“You’re going to do something stupid, aren’t you?”

“I need you to promise.”

“Oh my god, Robbie, what —”

“ _Alex_ —”

She jumped to her feet. “All right!” she cried, suddenly angry. “Fine! I won’t get involved! But what is it? What’s going to happen?”

Robbie looked away. “I can’t tell you.”

“Why not?”

Smirking, he leaned back against the tree with easy composure. “Because you’ll try to stop me.”

Sansa took a sharp breath and prayed to the gods for patience. “You _idiot_ ,” she nearly shrieked. “It’s something awful, isn’t it? Oh god, please don’t tell me you’re going to jail —”

“It’s not that bad. It’s —” he made a vague gesture with his hand, “— unconventional, is all.”

“What does that even _mean_?”

“I can’t tell you,” he said, still with that inappropriate nonchalance.

She wanted to wipe that infuriating smile off his face, to screech at him until he saw sense. “Can’t or won’t?”

“Alex —”

“Tell me. Whatever it is, just tell me. Let me help you.”

That, at least, managed to get through the facade. Robbie tensed slightly, his jaw clenching. His shadowed eyes slid to meet Sansa’s imploring stare. He looked older then, wearier than she had ever seen him.

“You can’t,” he said very, very softly. “This is something I have to do alone.”

Her stomach tied itself into a sour knot. _What do you know_? Sansa thought. _What do you know of being alone?_

“No you don’t,” she said, throat rough with emotion. “You don’t have to do it on your own. I can help —”

Robbie stood up at last, drawing himself up to his full height. “Then help me by staying out of it,” he said, his expression unreadable. “I need you to trust me on this.”

“How?” Sansa said. Her voice nearly broke, but she didn’t care. They were on the verge of something world-shattering, and she could feel it in her fingertips. “You’re not making any sense. You won’t tell me _anything_ —”

Robbie laid one hand on the back of her head, pulling her close. “If I did, I wouldn’t need you to trust me.”

He pressed a kiss to her forehead. Despite her years, Sansa had never felt more like a child, with her head tucked under her brother’s chin and the rising unease in her chest.

“Don’t do it,” she murmured, shoulders slumping as he stepped back. “Whatever it is, don’t do it.”

Robbie stayed still for another long while. “I have to,” he said eventually.

A huge heavy thing trailed the end of his words. For a fleeting instant, Sansa thought she saw a gleam of something like understanding in Robbie’s eyes. And then it was there again — that faint, persistent sliver of hope, slipping in like light through a crack. _He remembers_ , it was saying _. It’s not just you. He knows, he remembers. You’re not alone_.

Sansa pushed it aside. _Not now_ , she decided. _Not like this._

“At least tell me you’ll be all right,” she said tiredly.

He smirked again. “Don’t worry, I’m not going to end up behind bars.”

“ _Robbie_.”

“I’ll be all alright, Al,” he said, sounding amused. “I’m always all right.”

But of course she didn’t believe him.

Above them, the leaves rustled softly with the passing wind. Sansa tried to focus on that, on the wind’s gentle singing, and not the clammy dread pooling in her gut.

Somewhere inside her, a puzzle piece slid away.


	2. Chapter 1

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you so much to everyone who has read, commented, and left kudos so far!
> 
> Apologies if there are any misspellings or grammatical mistakes. English isn't my first language, so feel free to point them out if you spot any.

#### Chapter One

 

The first thing she noticed about James Lancaster was his hair. It was blond still, but longer and darker than when she had seen him last. His short beard was peppered with gray, and there were less lines on his face. He looked younger, more at ease, without that air of world-weariness that used to cling to him like a shadow.

But everything else was the same — the same high cheekbones, the same half-mocking smile, the same drawling voice. Even the way he moved was the same, the way he gestured with his hands and walked around the room as he spoke.

It was so distressingly familiar that Sansa found herself rooted to the spot, unable to tear her eyes away. She wasn’t sure how long she stood in the doorway, doing nothing more than gape uselessly at him, until he turned and met her gaze.

 _Blue_ , she realized, and something in her twinged painfully at the thought. _His eyes are blue_.

Sansa looked away. His smile may have seemed friendly enough, but she could still feel the heat rising in her cheeks. Ducking her head, she moved as quickly and as silently as she could to sit beside Elena, who seemed startled to see her.

“I didn’t think you were going to come,” Elena whispered.

“Why wouldn’t I?” Sansa muttered back as she pulled out her laptop.

“You were dead as a doornail when I left,” said Elena. “And yes, I did try to wake you. Short of throwing water in your face, in fact.”

“Maybe you should have.” Sansa sneaked a quick glance at the professor, disappointment coiling tightly in her chest. “How much did I miss?”

“Not a lot. You’re lucky he just started.”

“Did he give out the syllabus?”

“Yup.” At Sansa’s grimace, Elena snorted. “Don’t look so glum. There are worse things than talking to a teacher.”

There were, Sansa knew, but she couldn’t think of one as her fingers settled into a steady rhythm, trying to catch every word of the lecture. Throughout the class, she tried to stomp down the twisting sensation in her stomach, unable to decide if it was from excitement or nervousness or dejection or all of them at once.

There was a difference between seeing the man in her memory and seeing him in person. The lack of recognition in his eyes, the bland politeness in his smile when he looked at her . . . nothing could have prepared her for that. To have to see it every week, to have to see it for the rest of the semester. . . . Sansa didn’t know if could bear it.

 _Not like I have a choice now_.

The lecture ended much earlier than she would have liked. She waited as the students rushed to the door, then slid up to the front when the room was nearly empty. Her professor seemed just as eager to leave as the rest of the class, stuffing stacks of papers in his bag with quick, terse movements. He tensed slightly when he saw her, a stiffness entering his shoulders and jaw.

“Ah, it’s you, Miss . . . ?”

Sansa put on her best apologetic face. “Stiles, sir,” she said, though another name sat heavy on her tongue. “I wanted to apologize for my tardiness today.”

“Miss Stiles,” he repeated, the light tone belied by his thin smile. He held out her copy of the syllabus with one hand, swinging his bag over his shoulder with the other. “It’s not exactly the best impression to make, being late on the first day of class.”

Sansa took it quickly, willing her eyes not to linger on his hand. “No, sir. I’m very sorry, Professor. It won’t happen again.”

He was by the door before she could even gather the rest of her belongings. “See that it doesn’t,” he called over his shoulder.

Except by the time she entered the lecture hall the week after, the class was well underway, and her professor was in full swing. For a moment, Sansa thought she would be able to slink in unnoticed, but bright red hair never went well with stealth. She had only taken a few steps when the professor’s eyes landed on her, and the rest of the class turned to follow.

“So good of you to join us, Miss Stiles.” he said.

It threw her off guard, how quickly his face went from affable to stern when he saw her. Maybe that was why, though she had intended to appear contrite, the words flew out of her mouth in an inappropriately hard tone, “Glad to be here, Professor.”

The corner of his mouth twitched with what could have been amusement. “Do you have a good reason for your lateness, Miss Stiles?”

“I’m afraid I don’t, sir.”

His jaw clenched. Under his firm gaze, Sansa schooled her expression into cool blankness, willing herself not to fidget as she waited to be berated, to be made an example of in front of the entire class. But he didn’t — he turned away and continued his lecture as if the interruption didn’t happen.

“You could’ve just said the subway broke down,” said Elena once Sansa had slid into her seat.

“I almost did,” Sansa admitted.

“Why didn’t you?”

“I didn’t want to lie.”

Elena gave her an odd look, the one she reserved for slow toddlers and aging grandparents. “Well, he doesn’t have to know.”

True enough, but Sansa knew Elena wouldn’t understand. It wasn’t that Sansa didn’t lie — certainly, she had done it enough in both her lifetimes. It was that she had never lied to _him_. She had never needed to, and she didn’t want to start now. It would be too much like admitting that the man in front of her wasn’t who she wanted him to be, that the one she saw in her dreams and in her memories was truly gone for good.

“I’ll save it for next time,” said Sansa, shrugging. “Keep it down, would you? I’ve tested his patience enough as it is.”

The class was later dismissed with a reminder of an upcoming quiz, and her classmates groaned and muttered on their way out. Elena gave Sansa an encouraging smile before joining the thinning crowd. 

Like last week, Sansa went up to the front, where her professor was organizing the loose papers on his desk.

“Professor, I —”

“Was late again?” he said, not pausing at her approach. “I noticed.”

“I’m sorry, sir.”

“You’re not hurting my feelings, Miss Stiles. Just your attendance.”

“It won’t happen again.”

“You’ve said that last time. If I didn’t know better, I’d say you were making a habit of this.”

“I’m trying not to, sir.” It didn’t come out sounding as meek as it should have.

He noticed and looked up at her abruptly, his mouth twisting into an almost-smirk, almost-smile. “You’re not doing it on purpose, are you?”

“Why would I do that, Professor?”

“This isn’t one of your core classes. Some seem to think that’s reason enough to do away with the course and avoid attending it altogether.”

He had spoken so coolly, his expression bored and nonchalant, exactly as she remembered him, that she couldn’t quite swallow down the defiance in her voice. “I chose to take the course, Professor. It would be counterproductive if I go out of my way to avoid it.”

“Touche,” he said wryly. “How presumptuous of me to assume.”

“I’m really sorry, Professor. I’ll be on time next class.” _There — that sounded timid, didn’t it?_

He hummed. “Let’s hope third time’s the charm. If you had come on time, you’d know I give my exams before starting the day’s lecture.”

“And you don’t offer extra credit to those who miss it,” guessed Sansa.

“My department is against it, unless you have a suitable excuse. Unfortunately, tardiness isn’t one of them.”

“I understand, sir.”

As he gathered his things, Sansa could have sworn something flickered in his eyes. But she must have imagined it, for when he gave her one last glance as he moved to leave, he looked as somber as he had when she arrived.

“I’ve been lenient so far, Miss Stiles,” he said. “Don’t expect me to be so nice next time.”

He walked away before Sansa could come up with a response, and she could feel something inside her ache and sting with each step.

* * *

 

“ _California! What on earth is he doing in California?”_

Sansa bit back a sigh. For what felt like the hundredth time, she said, “I don’t know, Mom.”

Even over the phone, her mom managed to sound severe, concerned, and hysterical at the same time. _“Are you sure he didn’t tell you anything, Alexandra? Lord knows he hasn’t bothered to tell me anything since —”_

“No, Mom. He hasn’t contacted me in a while.”

“ _But he has kept in touch with you, hasn’t he?_ ”

“He has.”

 _He hasn’t. I haven’t heard from him in months._ But it wasn’t what either of them wanted to hear.

Nothing had been the same since Robbie had gone to college — ran away to Chicago, as their mom called it. Even now, a year after he had gotten his art degree, their mom was still upset that he had turned down Yale, and she never passed an opportunity to tell him so. It made his visits fraught with tension, and so Sansa hadn’t been surprised when he decided to stay in Chicago after his graduation. _That_ had led to yet another screaming match, one that she was sure Robbie only started to prove a point. Something about how he would rather starve than be a sellout, or something equally pointless and ridiculous.

Those years while he was away — and, later on, those first few months after he had gone back to Chicago — Robbie tried to keep in contact with Sansa, texting and calling her when he wasn’t busy with his schoolwork. He asked about her classes, gave her advice, made jokes about getting a plane ticket just to beat up her ex-boyfriends — they talked about the same mundane things they had always talked about, and sometimes it was almost as though he had never left. But then the calls that came every other day started coming only a once a week, then once a month, until suddenly she would only hear from him on holidays and birthdays.

When her nineteenth birthday came and went with nothing more than a belated greeting card in the mail, without his usual doodles or clever puns, Sansa knew she had hoped for too much. Robbie had a world of his own now, one that she hadn’t been a part of since she was fifteen and he left without so much as a goodbye.

She hadn’t thought it would set a precedence, that he would leave her behind _again_ , but maybe that had been too much to hope for as well.

“ _What has gotten into that brother of yours?_ ” her mom muttered on the other end as Sansa craned her neck to check on her roommate.

From where she stood in the corner of the living room, Sansa could see Jean working quietly in the kitchen, her eyes seemingly fixed on the saucepan. Sansa had been making dinner when her mom’s call came unexpectedly, and Jean had come to her rescue and wordlessly taken over where she had left off.

“ _He should have told us sooner,_ ” Mom was saying, voice low and worried. “ _Going halfway across the country . . . he shouldn’t have just upped and left. . . . Where did he even get the money for that?_ ”

“The postcard said he had a friend with him, didn’t he? Someone from school?”

She didn’t need to see her mom to know she was scowling. “ _Those_ friends _are a terrible influence_.”

Not that either of them would know. Robbie had never introduced them, and Sansa didn’t even know what his college friends looked like, what with how silent his social media had been since he ran off the first time. They could be the mafia, for all she knew.

“Well, at least we know where he is,” said Sansa, in the most reassuring tone she could muster. “He told us that much. It’s better than nothing.”    

“ _If only he told us why. . . ._ ” Mom heaved a deep sigh. “ _Your brother will be the death of me._ ”

A memory rose unbidden, of those terrible days in King’s Landing when she had heard of what happened at her uncle’s wedding . . . of how Mother had been butchered, how Robb’s body had been paraded like a rag doll. . . .

“Don’t say that, Mom,” said Sansa. “You’ll get wrinkles. You’re too young and pretty to get wrinkles.”

Her mom chuckled softly. “ _Enough about Robbie. How are your classes, sweetheart?_ ”

Another memory, this time of a green-eyed man with a sharp smile. _Except his eyes aren’t green anymore, are they?_ A pang burrowed in Sansa’s chest.

“They’re fine, Mom. Nothing I can’t handle.” Sansa glanced at Jean again. Her roommate may not have looked her way, but she knew Jean had heard enough on her end to be curious. “Listen, Mom, I’m gonna have company soon. I need to go.”

“ _All right_. _But call me if you hear from Robbie, or if you’re having trouble in school —_ ”

“I will, Mom. Love you.”

“ _Love you too, sweetheart_.”

As soon as her mother hung up, Sansa went back to the kitchen, hoping she didn’t look as worn out as she felt. Jean was draining the spaghetti when she came, pausing long enough to give Sansa a smile and to incline her head to the stove.

“The sauce tastes amazing, Al!” she said brightly. “The chicken’s almost done, too. Should be ready before they arrive.”

“Thanks. And sorry about my mom. She isn’t normally so. . . .” Sansa’s voice trailed away as she stirred the sauce.

Jean shrugged. “Don’t worry about it. Elena and I, we’ve got our fair share of family issues too. Overbearing mothers are a universal constant, I think.”

Sansa wanted to protest, to defend her mom despite herself, but Jean’s smile was so guileless that she decided to return it.

“Thanks for letting Gerald come over by the way,” she said as she combined the sauce and pasta, and Jean started setting the table.

“I should be thanking you — you’re the one making dinner. It must be serious.”

“What makes you say that?”

“Well, besides the fact that we’ve been living on ramen noodles and pizza? You’re willingly putting him in the same room as my sister.”

Sansa had to laugh at that. “It’s not like he hasn’t met Elena before. Remember that frat party?”

“Oh, I definitely remember. Hard to forget, with all the sobbing and rambling about how much she _ships_ —” Jean looked pained as she said it, and Sansa couldn’t help but snicker some more, “— the two of you. But it wasn’t really _official_ , you know? This is different.”

Just then, the timer for the chicken went off, giving Sansa time to mull over how to respond.

She knew what Jean meant. Sansa had known the West sisters since her freshman year, and in all that time, none of them had ever gone through the trouble of doing something as domestic as this — introducing the person they were dating over homemade dinner. It wasn’t that they didn’t know who was going out with who; it was more that they hadn’t really dated anyone long enough to consider bringing the person over to meet their friends.

So yes, Sansa knew what this must look like to Jean and Elena. Maybe if Sansa had met Gerald sooner, she wouldn’t have a problem telling Jean exactly what her friend wanted to hear. But she couldn’t bring herself to say it now, not when waves of guilt flooded her when she thought of _him_.

Which was ridiculous in itself, and Sansa knew it. And yet . . .

How could she explain this to Jean? How did one even begin to explain reincarnation and past lives and all these other absurd, incredible things that even Sansa still had trouble wrapping her head around?

One simply didn’t.

Sansa carefully avoided Jean’s gaze. “Elena’s not gonna scare him off,” she said, nonchalant. “She’s got more sense than that.”

Jean frowned at her. It looked like she wanted to press some more, but when she placed the chicken on the table, carefully sliced and portioned for the four of them, she only said dryly, “Assuming she has any.”

As if on cue, they heard the door swing open, followed by a loud, cheery, “Honey! I’m home!”

Jean rolled her eyes. “Speak of the devil,” she muttered. Then she called out, “In here!”

“Look who I found!” came Elena’s voice, with an edge of giddy laughter.

Sansa peered into the living room. Elena was grinning, holding a bottle of champagne over her head like it was a trophy, while her other hand gripped on the crook of Gerald’s arm. Gerald, who was standing there with a bouquet of flowers and wearing a smile that matched Sansa’s own — shy, amused, and tinged with bewilderment.

“Hi,” he said, and Sansa felt a flutter of warmth surge through her. “I brought flowers.”

“And champagne,” Elena said needlessly, still holding on to the bottle with obvious enthusiasm.

“You’re just in time,” said Sansa, taking the flowers as Elena led them to the table, where Jean had already placed a tall empty glass in the center.

“Anything I can do to help?” Gerald asked as Sansa arranged the flowers.

“Nope,” said Elena, who was pouring the champagne while Jean ushered the rest of them to their seats. “We’re just here to eat and look pretty.”

“Oh, good,” Gerald said, catching Sansa’s eye. “Well within my skill set.”

Sansa gave him a crooked smile. “Just for that, I’m making you do the dishes.”

As Sansa had expected, it was Elena who led the conversation as they ate. “So law school, huh? Is it as terrible as they say?”

“Worse,” Gerald said, laughing. “I’m essentially paying to get sleep deprived.”

 _It’s an attractive laugh_ , Sansa thought absently. But then, anyone would be hard-pressed to find anything about Gerald that wasn’t attractive, especially if one were into the tall, boy next door type. He was broad-shouldered and fairly fit, with dark blue eyes behind thick framed glasses that, on anyone else, would have seemed too hipster. His hair was dark and messy, in a way that suited him despite sticking up in all directions.

They chatted about school for a while, each of them complaining about their classes and their workload. Elena’s stories were as suitably dramatic as she was, but even Jean, who was scandalized at the thought of badmouthing her courses or her professors, had a few anecdotes of her own.

“My brother’s planning to study medicine too,” said Gerald. “Any advice?”

“Rethink his life choices,” Elena spoke up before Jean could. To Sansa’s surprise, Jean didn’t seem bothered by the interruption and nodded somberly in agreement.

“I’m really, really not the best person to ask,” Jean said, her face pink. It looked like the alcohol had done more than loosen her tongue. “Like — I’ve made so many bad decisions. So, so many. Everything I’ve done — they’ve all led me to this moment.”

Sansa and Elena exchanged glances, amused and disbelieving.

“Oh my god,” Elena said, letting out a delighted peal of laughter. “You _lightweight._ I can’t believe you got drunk on fucking champagne. Honestly, Jean — how are we related. Just how.”

Jean pulled a face. “Not so loud,” she complained. “And I’m not drunk — I’m tipsy. There’s a difference. Also, language.”

“Bullshit. You’re so not fooling anyone —”

Sansa left them to it. Drunk or otherwise, the two of them argued so often that she had learned to tune them out. Insults were a way of life between siblings, and seeing them like this, razzing each other as easy as breathing, reminded her too much of her own. It hurt to look at, sometimes.

She looked over at Gerald. He was watching them with a soft expression on his face, his gaze too distant for her apartment’s tiny kitchen. Sansa wondered if he was thinking about his brother then, just as she was thinking of Robbie.

“I didn’t know you have a brother,” Sansa said quietly. “You never talk about him.”

Gerald turned to her then, the far-off look fading from his face, his lips curving up in a smile. “Neither do you.”

She let out a soft snort. “Fair enough. His name’s Robbie and he went to art school. God knows what he’s doing now, but he’ll absolutely give you the cliché big brother talk the moment he sees you.”

“So I’ve got an overprotective brother to impress? Pressure.”

“He’s a total dork, really. Just tell him you liked comics before it was cool and you’ll be best friends for life. Your turn.”

Gerald fell silent long enough that she worried she had overstepped, but then the smile came back in full force, his glasses just the tiniest bit crooked. It was such a charming picture that she could almost ignore the sadness that had flickered over his face.

“Foster brother,” he said at last. “Jonah. He’s been staying over at my place, actually. We’ve known each other for ten years, and I’m pretty sure he still listens to the same playlist from middle school. Has yet to outgrow his emo phase, but he’ll deny it to his grave. ”

The unmistakable fondness in his tone made Sansa grin. “I bet he has all the embarrassing stories.”

“Is that really a war you want to start right now?” Gerald said, with a meaningful look toward her roommates.

Elena had paused in the middle of a rant, arms pinwheeling and all, to look up at Sansa with a smile that could only be described as devious.

“I can be bribed,” she said in a solemn tone. At Sansa’s glare, Elena lifted her arms up in mock surrender, but her eyes didn’t lose the evil glint Sansa knew all too well. “But you won’t get a peep out of me because Alex is practically perfect in every way.”

“I can believe that,” Gerald said.

Sansa nudged his shoulder with her own. “Flatterer.”

“I mean it. Is there anything you can’t do?”

He looked so earnest that she had to look away, tapping her chin with her finger as she pretended to think it over. “I don’t know how to tap dance.”

“Tragic,” Jean deadpanned, thoroughly ruining the moment.

Elena snickered. “So drunk,” she said, happily pouring everyone another round as Jean groaned and dropped her head on the table.

They talked some more, exchanging stories long after they had finished the food on their plates. Elena was the sort of person who never ran out of things to talk about, usually derailing into sweeping monologues and hilarious ramblings. Gerald had some of his own childhood stories to tell, most of them about his antics with Jonah. Listening to him somehow made it easier to talk about Robbie, and soon Sansa was sharing the ridiculous things they had done as children. It made her feel lighter then, like some of the weight that had settled since Robbie left had been lifted, though Sansa supposed that could just as well be the pleasant buzz of alcohol as much as the company.

Jean was mostly silent through it all, making the occasional sarcastic comment that had Elena cackling and Sansa smiling into her drink — Drunk Jean was exactly like Sober Jean, minus the lack of tact.

A lull fell over around midnight, when Jean excused herself and went to bed, and everyone seemed to realize their own sleepiness. Gerald volunteered to help with the plates, but Elena slapped his hands away when he tried to bring them to the sink. She shooed him and Sansa to the living room, eyebrows waggling. Sansa was too sloshed to argue or feel as embarrassed as she would have, but not so much that she wasn’t aware of Gerald's fingers brushing against hers when she walked him to the door.

“Had fun?” Sansa said, once they were out of Elena’s sight.

He chuckled. “Loads.” Then he paused, like he was bracing himself for the worst, and said hesitantly, “We should do it again. With Jonah, I mean. We’d probably end up getting takeout though, because I’m a disaster in front of a stove.”

He looked nervous and hopeful as the words spilled out of him, and Sansa leaned forward and kissed his cheek. “I’d like that,” she said, lacing their fingers together.

He grinned, emboldened. “Are you doing anything this weekend?”

“Study for class, mope in my pajamas, the usual.” She made a face, suddenly remembering. “Oh, and I have to go to a museum.”

“Touristy thing or extra credit?”

“Extra credit. I have to visit this new exhibit for history class.”

He perked up at that. “I know a bit about history.”

“More than a bit, I hope. Being a history major and all.”

“Very funny.”

“I’m hilarious.” She stepped closer, smiling, and brushed back the tuft of hair that had fallen over his forehead. “You can tag along, if you want. I’ll even let you write my paper for me.”

“No to the paper, but I can buy dinner instead.”

“It’s a date.”

Then he leaned down and kissed her, soft and slow, and it was like every nerve in Sansa’s body screamed awake. _This is the stuff of movies_ , she thought distantly, half remembering those 90s romcoms and how they ended with a sweet kiss and the romantic swell of music.

When Gerald finally left, Sansa wandered back into the kitchen and sat on the table, feeling mildly stunned. More than stunned. Her insides felt like a tangle of knots she couldn’t unravel, like she was about to burst from feeling so much, all this roiling mess of emotions and memories. Some of it must have shown on her face — though which ones, Sansa didn’t know — because Elena took one look at her and gave her a knowing smirk.

“So what did lover boy say?” she said, setting the last plate in the dish dryer.

It was enough to jolt Sansa from her reverie, and she turned to Elena with an impassive look.

“Nothing much,” she said primly. Her attempt to avoid answering was met with an onslaught of booing, and she let it go on until Elena’s voice rose to a bellow. “Shh! You’ll wake Jean!”

Elena scoffed. “You’ve seen her. She’s too shit-faced to return to the land of the living. So spill.”

Sansa rolled her eyes. “Fine, okay,” she said finally, folding under Elena’s playful but intense stare. “We’re going to the museum this weekend. Happy?”

“Ecstatic,” said Elena as she hopped on the counter, practically brimming with childlike glee. “You’re so adorable, the two of you. It’s like it was only yesterday you were dancing around each other, denying your feelings and making us suffer through your sexual tension and everything.” She pretended to wipe away a tear. “My babies have grown up so fast.”

Sansa shook her head, too amused to sound disapproving. “You’re enjoying this too much.”

“You wouldn’t have met if it wasn’t for me,” said Elena with an air of great importance. “So technically everything that happens with you two is my personal responsibility. You’re welcome.”

“Don’t jinx it.”

“There’s nothing to jinx — it’s meant to be. I feel it in my bones.”

“Thank you for the soaring motivation.”

“I expect a June wedding. And your firstborn.”

* * *

 

Sansa wasn’t surprised that Elena had fallen asleep right away. As much as Elena had teased Jean about being drunk, she hadn’t exactly been sober herself.

Then again, Sansa wasn’t so clearheaded either. Her good mood had faded the moment her head hit the pillow, and she laid awake, listening to Elena’s soft snores from the bed above her own.

In the dark, she could no longer ignore the roiling feeling that burned in her stomach when Gerald had kissed her. The laces of guilt that crept into her mind when he had smiled and laughed and said something witty, and each time Sansa couldn’t help but think, _You’re not Jaime._

It was ridiculous, she knew, to think about him still after all this time. To lose sleep over a man who wasn’t — who might not even — who didn’t . . .

He didn’t even recognize her, in this world.        

Would it have made a difference, if he did? If she had seen him again earlier, before Gerald came along? If she hadn’t seen him again at all?

Sansa shot out of bed and began to pace the small length of the bedroom. No, she wasn’t going to lose sleep over him. If she really was going to stay awake, she would do it over something productive — like studying or reading or _something_ — and not because she was pining over —

She stopped suddenly, her eyes landing on the postcard she had left on her desk that morning. Yet another thing she had been trying not to think about all day.

When she had gotten it, she had read the message on the back over and over, hoping to glean anything at all about what Robbie was up to. But he was still as cryptic ever, and it did nothing to reassure her — _See? Not in jail. Staying with a friend. Try not to worry too much._

As though it was that easy. As though he wasn’t keeping secrets from her and leaving her in the dark for the past five years.

The one he sent their mother said something similar, along the lines of being on vacation with some unnamed friend from school. The front showed the words _Greetings from Long Beach, California!_ in bold, gaudy colors. It was so unlike Robbie that when Mom had sent her a picture of it, Sansa’s first thought had been, _Oh no he’s eloped_. She knew her mom feared the same thing, though neither of them had voiced it aloud.

The postcard he gave Sansa was different though. It wasn’t as flashy or colorful — it wasn’t even from California.

It was from Washington — only two hundred fifty miles from where she was. _He’s a four hour bus ride away_ , she realized, staring at the postcard of the Smithsonian _. He’s an hour ride away from Mom._

Worry settled and gnawed as the clock on her desk ticked, second by second. Sansa wasn't sure how much time managed to slip through her fingers before she heard the rustle of sheets, and she turned to see Jean sitting up on her bed.

“Alex?” said Jean, rubbing her eyes blearily. “You’re still up?”

Sansa shrugged. “Couldn’t sleep.”

Jean frowned, studying her face like one would a particularly hard math problem, then dragged herself out of the room. She came back a few minutes later with a glass of milk, looking a little more awake but still groggy.

“Sleep,” Jean said, pushing the glass to Sansa as if commanding the word to fly in her general direction. “There’s, like, not enough science on it. Chemically. But, you know, placebo.”

Sansa didn’t know, but she drank the milk anyway. As Sansa quietly sipped, Jean sat back on her bed and dropped her face on her hands, groaning.

“I’m going to have a hangover in the morning, aren’t I?” she moaned.

“It’s morning already, if that helps,”

“Not really,” Jean grumbled, then laid back to burrow herself in her blankets. “Never let me near champagne again. Why did he even bring that thing anyway?”

Sansa smiled, though Jean couldn’t see it under her nest of pillows. “Housewarming present.”

“We’ve lived in the same building for years. Why do we need a housewarming?”

“Elena convinced him that changing floors is a big deal. Apparently going through one less flight of stairs was cause for celebration.”

“Damn it,” Jean muttered. “I knew this was her fault.”

“Language.”

“Oh shut up.”

Neither of them said anything for a while. Jean was quiet for so long that Sansa had thought she had fallen asleep, when suddenly she said, “I like him. He’s nice.”

 _Nice._ Sansa had known her long enough to know that _nice_ was the equivalent of a sound seal of approval in Jean-speak. _Nice_ was practically a glowing commendation. _Nice_ meant her friends approved.

She should be happy about that. She should be thrilled.

“I know.” Sansa cringed as soon as she said it. It sounded sad, more regretful than such a simple statement had any right to be.

Even in her half-awake state, Jean heard it. She sat up again, concern plain in her furrowed brows.

“I know it’s not any of my business,” Jean said softly, “but if you want to talk about it . . . but it’s cool if you don’t. We’re not going to pry or push you, but we’re here. Any time you need us.”

She meant it. Jean was the type to say things like that unironically, and to mean every word wholeheartedly.

Sansa flashed a genuine smile as Jean reached out and squeezed her hand. She thought, fleetingly, of how there was something familiar about Jean, something she had yet to place. It wasn’t like her dreams of her family or her memories of the father she had never known — it was more like she had learned some obscure word, but couldn’t quite remember what it meant or how to use it.

“Thanks, Jean,” she said, squeezing back.

* * *

 

The new coffee shop across Sansa’s apartment was quaint, tidy, and perpetually busy. It seemed that whenever she went there to study, the line to the counter stretched to the door and the tables were almost always full. It was so crowded that there were hardly ever any empty sockets, and the drone of activity drowned out the jazz music humming from the speakers. Normally she found the murmur of conversation soothing, like the soft patter of raindrops on a restless afternoon.

Normally.

With a groan, Sansa laid her head on the table. There was so much she needed to do — chapters to read, papers to write, deadlines to meet — but she had been stuck on the same book, on the same page, on the same sentence for what seemed like ages now. _It’s no use. I’m never going to get anything done at this rate._

While she never minded going to the coffee shop on her own, Sansa wished Elena was with her. If Elena was there, at least Sansa could blame her lack of progress on her friend’s boundless chatter. At least then, she would have someone to distract her from thinking about Robbie, with all his stupid secrets and his stupid postcards. . . .

And why she couldn’t seem to bring herself to tell her mom about it.

Was her brother even really in Washington? And if he was, why was he there? Why tell their mom otherwise? Why tell Sansa, through a postcard of all things, after months of not even a single text?

Was this a late onset of teenage rebellion? Some sort of elaborate prank?

She wanted to believe, more than anything, that it was just that. That this was all a convoluted surprise for their mom and that he was coming home at last. But Sansa knew it wasn’t that simple. Nothing had ever been simple in her life, not since she left Winterfell.

“Miss Stiles?”

Sansa jumped, nearly knocking over her papers in the process. James Lancaster was standing there, carrying a tray of food.

“Do you mind if I sat with you for a couple of minutes?” he went on, a corner of his lips lifting into what could have been a smile. “There aren’t any empty seats and I’d rather not spend my lunch break out in the rain.”

“Um,” Sansa started. “Hi — uh — good morning, Professor.”

“Afternoon now, actually.” He gestured to the table. “May I?”

She immediately moved her things to make space, feeling her ears warm. “Oh, yes, of course,” she said weakly.

He sat down and nodded toward her book. “Hard at work?”

Sansa could only nod, still mortified that he had seen her on the cusp of banging her head against the table. He was eyeing her things, humming noncommittally as he sipped his drink.

“You’re majoring in Political Science, aren’t you?” he said. She nodded again, and he continued, “You’re lot always seems to end up in my class. It’s a good pairing, pol sci and philosophy. Sensible choice.”

“I didn’t actually choose it for that,” she found herself saying. “Well, it’s part of the reason. Mostly it’s because my friend Elena — Elena West — didn’t want to take it alone.”

“Same major as you?”

“No.” She shook her head, smiling slightly. “Film studies.”

He seemed genuinely surprised at that. “That’s a first,” he said. “I never would have guessed.”

Silence fell. Sansa wracked her brain for something else to say, but realized, with a pang, that she couldn’t think of anything to add, and so the ringing quiet stretched on.

She set herself to focusing on her book, but her attention kept wandering and she found herself staring out the window and glancing around at the other customers. More than once, her eyes strayed to her professor without her meaning to, and she had to hurriedly avert her gaze before he could catch her staring.

At some point, she started thinking of how strange it was — him, being a professor. Her professor. He was good at it, she could admit that much, but she still had trouble imagining it. The thought of him sitting down to grade papers, to plan out his lessons and make exams, wasn’t an image she could picture easily. It didn’t fit the man she remembered, the one who had spent his whole life — his other life — with a sword in hand, garbed in armor and fighting in battle after battle.

Sansa hadn’t planned to ask, but suddenly the words were out of her mouth before she could rein them in. “Why philosophy?”

He shrugged, but she didn’t miss the odd expression that crossed his face. “Why not? I could ask you the same about law.”

“I never said I was going to take law.”

“Easy enough to guess. What else could you do with a political science degree?”

She lifted her chin. “A lot,” she said, then began to list all the job prospects her degree offered, explaining each as best as she could as she tried to remember all the websites she had looked at when she had been in high school and trying to map out her future. Her tirade would have gone on for longer, had he not tipped his head back and laughed, the sound of it stunning her into silence.

“You’ve done your research,” he said, smirking. “I’m impressed.”

Sansa narrowed her eyes at him. “You think it’s a useless degree.”

“I never said it was.”

“You implied it.”

His smirk grew into a crooked smile. “I’ve offended you,” he said, sounding oddly pleased. “My apologies, Miss Stiles, but I doubt you want to spend the rest of your life doing PR and writing speeches for politicians.”

“It’s my life’s dream,” she said dryly.

It struck her then how absurd this was, the fact that she was trying to make small talk with _him_ , of all people. How it bordered too close to actual bantering with her _professor_.

He seemed to be thinking the same thing, because just as she had forced her gaze back to her book, he said, “This is weird, isn’t it?”

She blinked, taken aback by the fact that he had just said something so modern, so mundane as _weird_.

“Why would it be weird, sir?” she said slowly.

He was looking at her in askance. “Because I’m your teacher. I understand if you find it awkward, me sitting here like this.”

But it wasn’t because of that. She had talked to her professors before, and had no problem making meaningless conversation with them outside of class. Had it been another lecturer sitting with her now, she was sure she wouldn’t have minded at all.

Except James Lancaster wasn’t just a professor. Sansa knew, no matter how different he looked or talked or acted toward her, she would never see him as just that. She would always remember him as someone else — another man from another time, from a world long dead.

Talking had come easy to them, before. There had never been any need for awkward pleasantries between them, for false courtesies and pretty words. It had been so long since she had used them against him that she didn’t think she could do it again. With him, she had simply been Sansa, just as he had simply been Jaime.

 _Jaime_. He would always be Jaime to her, just as Alex Stiles had always been Sansa Stark.

“I — I suppose,” she began. Before she would have gripped the skirts of her gown, but now she had to settle for folding her hands on her lap to keep them from wringing. “It’s because I don’t know you very well, sir.”

He was watching her closely, and it took all her self-control to hold his gaze, to keep her own steady and unwavering.

“I keep to myself, most of the time,” she continued. “And I don’t really know how to talk to people I don’t know well. So I guess —” she smiled then, small and unsure, “— every conversation with me is going to be weird at first.”

He said nothing for a moment, tearing his eyes away. She hadn’t noticed how on edge he seemed until then, how his muscles were bunched up and tense.

“We should work on that then,” he said eventually.

Before she could wonder what it meant, before she could even stoke the sudden flash of hope that rushed through her, Sansa’s phone rang.

“Oh no,” she said grimly as she stared at the screen.

His eyebrows lifted. “Something wrong, Miss Stiles?”

She gathered her things as quickly as she could. “I’m sorry, Professor,” she said, feeling a blush start to spread across her cheeks. “I have to go to class.”

He chuckled. “Maybe I shouldn’t take it personally after all,” he said, smiling.

 _I know that smile_ , Sansa thought, pausing abruptly. It was the same smile he had given her each time he found her wandering the halls of Winterfell, plagued by doubts and uncertainty and ghosts of long ago. The smile he had worn all those times he stared at her when he thought she wasn’t looking. The same one that made her wonder, in those too brief moments when she allowed herself to hope, if he saved that smile just for her.

In this light, he never looked more like Jaime Lannister.

“No,” she said, laughing a little. “I think I was in high school, the last time I actually came to class on time.”

“Ah,” he said, as if this somehow finally all made sense. “Used to being waited on?”

 _Like royalty_ , she was tempted to say, but she could already imagine Robbie rolling his eyes at such a poor joke. So she beamed at him instead, huffing a tiny laugh as she shouldered her bag.

“Enjoy your lunch, Professor,” she said. She liked to think Jaime had stared after her as she left, before she had rounded the corner and sprinted back to campus.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thoughts? I'd love to hear what you guys think!


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